McNerney’s chief of staff will be Erich Pfuehler, who as Clean Water Action‘s California Director helped bring that organization’s grassroots oomph to bear in McNerney’s campaign to unseat Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Tracy; earlier, Pfuehler was chief of staff to former Rep. David Bonior, D-Mich., who was a House Democratic Whip.

His DC chief of staff will be Angela Kouters, a staffer at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, and earlier, an aide to former U.S. Sen. Fritz Hollings, D-S.C. This is interesting because McNerney wasn’t the DCCC’s pick for the 11th District: It supported Danville airline pilot Steve Filson in the Democratic primary, and took some heat from McNerney’s grassroots supporters for giving too little, too late to his campaign.

McNerney’s legislative director will be Nick Holder, who has been a senior legislative assistant handling military, agriculture, environment, transportation and budget issues for Rep. Tim Bishop, D-NY. Bishop sits on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, to which McNerney has just been named.

Andy Stone will be McNerney’s communications director. Stone most recently was a communications strategist at M+R Strategic Services, where he consulted on Democrat Phil Angelides’ gubernatorial campaign. He specializes in working with nonprofits and political campaigns to create effective online advocacy campaigns; McNerney’s online organizing — through “netroots” bloggers, his own Web site and other avenues — proved crucial to his victory.

And McNerney’s district director in Stockton will be Angel Picon, a field organizer with SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West as well as past president of the Stockton chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens. He also has hired Livermore native and recent Santa Clara University School of Law graduate Tobin Dietrich as a legislative assistant; Linden resident Teresa Frison, who’d been McNerney’s San Joaquin campaign field director, as a scheduler; and Kensington resident Andreas Mueller, another campaign staffer, as a staff assistant, all in the Washington office.